A fun read: a real Sennheiser HE-1 unboxing by a real person

[okok]

The idea would be nice... buy a HE4xx or HE400SE add 6B of low bass and you have a HE1 and buy a $ 60k amplifier to go with it to invoke the price bias thing of the setup which won't occur when using the Atom amp. Must have been price bias that I did not keep the hifiman I owned (aside from a modified HE35X).

how to prove our beloved he400se can become he1 with the right EQ setting? many are waiting for the preset...

 

[solderdude]

Must be Oratory EQ.... but then again.... is the HE4XX actually the same as HE400SE but with a different color and price ?

 

[jae]

I am unsure if this is true but I heard the HE-1 amplifier was using some kind of EQ/affected the output signal. Can someone confirm?

 

[Dazerdoreal]

how to prove our beloved he400se can become he1 with the right EQ setting? many are waiting for the preset...

In case you want to give it a try :

Preamp: -9.5 dB
Filter 1: ON PK Fc 20 Hz Gain 9.5 dB Q 0.600
Filter 2: ON PK Fc 59 Hz Gain 1.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 3: ON PK Fc 350 Hz Gain 0.5 dB Q 5.000
Filter 4: ON PK Fc 1250 Hz Gain 1.0 dB Q 8.000
Filter 5: ON PK Fc 1700 Hz Gain -2.5 dB Q 0.600
Filter 6: ON PK Fc 1900 Hz Gain 4.5 dB Q 2.000
Filter 7: ON PK Fc 3500 Hz Gain 2.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 8: ON PK Fc 4800 Hz Gain -4.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 9: ON PK Fc 6000 Hz Gain 5.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 10: ON PK Fc 9100 Hz Gain -4.0 dB Q 1.900
Filter 11: ON PK Fc 9500 Hz Gain -2.0 dB Q 11.000
Filter 12: ON PK Fc 11000 Hz Gain 2.5 dB Q 0.500

 

[RayDunzl]

There's no way to know how many units have been made after this SN

I had a friend in Miami, whose father had been president of a big printing company up north, and was taking orders locally for various types of multipart (pink/blue/yellow pages with carbon between) business forms. Remember those?

He only had a few customers, a couple of hospitals and similar, just enough to pay his "retirement".

When he got an order, he'd tear off 20~30 pages in his pre-numbered multipart form order book and throw them in the trash.

That way, his customers wouldn't notice that each month their invoice number only incremented by 3 or 4.

Charlie was a cool guy, I liked him.

 

[solderdude]

I am unsure if this is true but I heard the HE-1 amplifier was using some kind of EQ/affected the output signal. Can someone confirm?

Yes, EQ is used to get the response the way Sennheiser wants it to be (afaik only in the lows).
Non defeatable. So I was told....

 

[MacCali]

I am curious how it sounds. Headphones are ment to put on your ears. The purpose is listen music.

@ManuCV you are able to hear them at I think two or three locations. I believe one is in san francisco, at like Sennheiser headquarters or something and also NY. I forget where.

Clearly if you are selling something for 60k you would let someone demo before they buy lol

 

[ManuCV]

@ManuCV you are able to hear them at I think two or three locations. I believe one is in san francisco, at like Sennheiser headquarters or something and also NY. I forget where.

Clearly if you are selling something for 60k you would let someone demo before they buy lol

@MacCali funnily I am in Germany (can't get any closer to Sennheiser!) and I am not aware of any Sennheiser showrooms around here. Honestly I am not in the market for the HE-1 at all, but would gladly try them just to have the experience.

 

[killdozzer]

Silly.

 

[Pe8er]

I asked the guy to ship them to Amir for measurements, unsurprisingly he was not into it

 

[RayDunzl]

funnily I am in Germany (can't get any closer to Sennheiser!) and I am not aware of any Sennheiser showrooms around here.

Some are temporarily closed, it says, but...

Berlin and Singapore maybe still open.

Sennheiser

en-us.sennheiser.com

 

[ManuCV]

Some are temporarily closed, it says, but...

Berlin and Singapore maybe still open.

View attachment 252008

Sennheiser

en-us.sennheiser.com

As per your link, they are indeed closing all shops - indefinitely.

"

Sennheiser closes its stores​

​

NOVEMBER 12, 2020
Old Lyme, Connecticut, November 12, 2020 - Sennheiser will gradually close its stores in Berlin, Sydney, San Francisco, Mexico City, Seoul and Singapore over the coming months."

 

[Galliardist]

The Sydney store converted to permanently closed a few months ago according to a notice in the window, and later the store website

 

[bodhi]

I wonder if the target audience would be any different if they cost 600k.

 

[NSX]

Sennheiser closes its stores​

Sennheiser has sold its consumer audio division in 2021. The business has been acquired by a Swiss-based medical hearing company called Sonova Holding AG, which specialises in hearing aids and cochlear implants.

 

[xeizo]

In case you want to give it a try :

Preamp: -9.5 dB
Filter 1: ON PK Fc 20 Hz Gain 9.5 dB Q 0.600
Filter 2: ON PK Fc 59 Hz Gain 1.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 3: ON PK Fc 350 Hz Gain 0.5 dB Q 5.000
Filter 4: ON PK Fc 1250 Hz Gain 1.0 dB Q 8.000
Filter 5: ON PK Fc 1700 Hz Gain -2.5 dB Q 0.600
Filter 6: ON PK Fc 1900 Hz Gain 4.5 dB Q 2.000
Filter 7: ON PK Fc 3500 Hz Gain 2.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 8: ON PK Fc 4800 Hz Gain -4.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 9: ON PK Fc 6000 Hz Gain 5.0 dB Q 2.000
Filter 10: ON PK Fc 9100 Hz Gain -4.0 dB Q 1.900
Filter 11: ON PK Fc 9500 Hz Gain -2.0 dB Q 11.000
Filter 12: ON PK Fc 11000 Hz Gain 2.5 dB Q 0.500

Thanks! Running this EQ now, sounds good!

 

[neg]

I am curious if it measures better than the Expanse.

HE-1 has similar frequency response. I've listened to he-1 for a while, and I'm also the owner of the expanse. I can confirm that I like expanse subjective sounding much more. Expanse is faster, more detailed, more neutral and more versatile. However, the he-1's sound reasonably good, with great bass and spatial in-depth separation. The distance in space to the first object is he-1 higher than in DC Expanse. HE-1 delivers very beautiful vocals to you. I enjoyed to listen Dead can dance in them. However, for me, he-1s have a strong coloration. It's don't convey negative emotions well for example. It's are not so perfect that bloggers claims. But it's far, far away better than any electrostatics that I've tried.

 

[ManuCV]

HE-1 delivers very beautiful vocals to you. I enjoyed to listen Dead can dance in them.

Lisa Gerrard's voice thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[metasharp]

I agree with some previous poster, if we put aside "subjectivity".... HE-1 is not bad at all but still not at Dan Clark Audio Stealth level which cost less than 8% of the price (counting a SOTA dac and headphone amp) :

In-Ear Fidelity – Headphone Graph Comparison Tool

Easily compare industry-standard frequency response measurements of hundreds and hundreds of headphones.

crinacle.com

 

[ObjectiveSubjectivist]

There are plenty of folks that found it meh.

I bet the same folks like abyss 1266 tc (total crap)
Audiophiles look for weirdness not for accurate sound. So I'm not surprised that many said that he1 are meh